Live chat: Reporters discuss surge of heroin in Erie County

STAFF REPORT

January 29, 2014 05:36 AM

STAFF REPORT

January 29, 2014 05:36 AM

Erie Times-News reporters Tim Hahn and Ed Palattella discussed the surge of heroin in Erie and answered questions about heroin use and overdoses in Tuesday's GoErie.com live chat.Replay the entire chat at GoErie.com/chat.

Erie Times-News reporters Tim Hahn and Ed Palattella discussed the surge of heroin in Erie and answered questions about heroin use and overdoses in Tuesday's GoErie.com live chat. Here are a few highlights:

Q We already know it's dangerous. It's a risk that you will die if you use it. What more should be done?

Ed Palattella: Several officials we spoke to suggested tightening regulations for the use of opioid painkillers, such as OxyContin, as a way to crack down on the availability of those drugs. The prevailing medical opinion is that ready access to prescription opioids often progresses to heroin use.

Public awareness of the problem is a start as well.

Tim Hahn: I think we have to work harder at stressing the danger of this drug, including how addictive it is.

We need to get this message out to younger kids, because many of the deaths we're seeing are of people in their late teens and early 20s. And, of course, something has to be done to keep this drug from getting into the community. No easy task, according to drug investigators, because for every dealer they take down another steps in.

Q Why and how are high school kids getting ahold of this stuff?

Tim Hahn: Sad to say that most people tell us it is very easy to get. What concerns us is that a few years ago when prescription drug abuse was so rampant, we heard that it wasn't too hard to get pills from friends, acquaintances ... someone's medicine cabinet. Now it sounds like getting heroin is even easier.

Q Is there a specific city law enforcement thinks its coming from?

Ed Palattella: Law enforcement mentions Detroit most frequently -- it has been a big source of other illegal drugs, and guns, in Erie in the past.

Baltimore and New York have also come up. As for heroin production, Mexico is now high on the list, behind the traditional huge producer -- Afghanistan.

Erie Times-News reporters Tim Hahn and Ed Palattella discussed the surge of heroin in Erie and answered questions about heroin use and overdoses in Tuesday's GoErie.com live chat.Replay the entire chat at GoErie.com/chat.